Exemplary embodiments of the present invention relate generally to a system and method for verifying the identity of a party acknowledging a document or other agreement.
Known methods of verifying the identity of a person acknowledging a document generally consist of a system of witnesses, such as the use of a notary public. With the increasing amount of business transactions occurring remotely over the Internet, a method is needed to verify the identity of the person signing or assenting to an agreement when the signing or assenting takes place remotely to available witnesses.
When conducting business over the Internet or other type of remote transaction, accepting the terms and conditions of an agreement may be accomplished by any of several methods. Examples of these methods include: selecting a checkbox, clicking on an “I agree” or similar button, typing the user's name as a signature, or using a mouse, finger, or stylus as a signature or acknowledgment. While methods such as these have generally been found adequate to assent to the terms of an agreement, the methods themselves don't perform any significant level of authentication and may leave a party to the transaction susceptible to claims that the other party did not perform the claimed authentication.
Known methods of authentication of Internet or other types of remote transactions and agreements generally involve a user enrolling for an authentication service by selecting a user name and password. Certain known authentication methods may require the user to provide additional information such as email addresses, physical addresses, or telephone numbers. When using such a method to authenticate a user, that user generally must log onto the system and enter a username and password. The system may then use a method of encrypting the information from the connection between the user and the recipient of the system to insure that at least the computing device connected to the system was caused to be connected by someone previously identified. Despite the required information, the person or organization asking for an acknowledgement is not able to authenticate that the person enrolling for the service is actually who he says he is. The present invention provides a system and method for visual authentication of the person who is accepting the terms of an agreement by “signing” or other methods as described earlier.
In an embodiment of the invention, a computing device may be configured to authenticate a person or persons acknowledging an agreement by capturing images, using a digital image capture device, of such person or persons as they perform the acknowledgement. Such an image device may be configured to capture single images or a continuous stream of images that result in a video recording. In another embodiment of the invention, a first computing device, such as a computer server, connected via a network to a second computing device may be configured to send instructions to the second computing device. Those instructions may configure the second computing device to capture images to be used to authenticate a person or persons acknowledging an agreement. In another embodiment of the invention, a computing device may be configured to restrict the time during which a user is permitted to acknowledge an agreement. In another embodiment of the invention, a computing device may be configured to generate random codes which are then provided to a user as part of a user authentication process. In another embodiment of the invention, a computing device may be placed in electronic communication with a device for recording biometric information from the user. The computing device may be configured to store this biometric information along with other types of authentication information recorded during the acknowledgment process to allow for further user authentication capabilities. In another embodiment of the invention, a computing device may be configured to perform the above described image capture functions when the computing device is not connected to an external data network. In this embodiment, the computing device may store images and other information related to an acknowledgement process for later delivery to an external server or computing device. In another embodiment of the invention, a first computing device may be configured to provide information related to an acknowledgment directly to a second computing device, without the requirement of a server to receive and store the information. In other embodiments of the invention, a computing device used in the authentication process may be authenticated by a second computer device or computer server to confirm that the first computer device is associated with the person or entity performing the acknowledgment. In certain embodiments of the invention, a person or party wishing to use the invention to acknowledge an agreement or other document may be required to provide additional evidence of their identity through the use of an identification document containing a photographic image. In such a manner, a party or organization that wishes to authenticate the acknowledging party may compare the provided identification document to images recorded during the acknowledgement process in order to confirm the identity of the authenticator. In some embodiments of the invention, the location from which a computer device is used to perform an acknowledgement may be restricted to certain predetermined locations. Alternatively, certain locations may be expressly excluded. For example, a party or organization may be restricted from authentication outside a certain state, region, or country in order to comply with legal requirements applicable to a particular agreement to be authenticated.
In addition to the novel features and advantages mentioned above, other benefits will be readily apparent from the following descriptions of the drawings and exemplary embodiments.